


Clouds and All in Your Coffee

by Miaou Jones (miaoujones)



Category: South Park
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-22
Updated: 2011-11-22
Packaged: 2017-10-26 10:19:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/281915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miaoujones/pseuds/Miaou%20Jones
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Now that Eric has stopped being a kid, Butters tries to catch up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Clouds and All in Your Coffee

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hollycomb](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=hollycomb).



> _20 min. on[Write or Die](http://writeordie.com)  
>  prompt: Cartman/Butters - frosting_

Butters paused on the doorstep, balancing the plate of cupcakes in one hand as he reached behind him and grabbed onto his tail. On his way over, he'd discovered that the Mr. Biggles costume had a tendency to ride up back there, which he didn't remember—although, come to think of it, maybe it was only doing that now because he was bigger than the last (and first, and only other) time he'd worn it. Butters tugged the tail. At least it had this handy little way to unwedgie yourself.

He wished there was a big mirror or something so he could make sure he still looked all right; he'd had to unwedgie himself a bunch of times on the way over. It was probably okay, though. It wasn't like he'd gotten his face in a wedgie or anything and the cupcakes were still just as pretty as when he'd left his house, although the frosting was a little mushed by the cellophane. But you could still see that they all had smiley faces.

Taking a deep breath and putting on a smile even bigger than the ones he'd given the cupcakes (although probably not as delicious), Butters rang the doorbell.

He had to ring it a second time before there was a shuffling inside and then the door opened.

The whole way over and even before that, as soon as he first got the idea, Butters had been preparing himself for this moment. He braced himself for the clever words, whatever they would be (Butters couldn't even imagine that part, since he wasn't so clever himself), and the inevitable laughter.

But as he looked Butters up and down, and then up and down again, Eric didn't make a sound.

Butters smiled real extra big as Eric's eyes moved up from the bear feet, all the way up to Butters' face. When their eyes met, Eric blinked a couple of times, then slapped his forehead. "Jesus Christ, Butters."

"Hi, Eric! I brought some cupcakes over."

Eric dropped his hand from his forehead and looked at Butters hard again. "Butters, what the hell are you doing?"

"Um, well." Butters kind of thought he'd just told Eric what he was doing...but maybe Eric hadn't heard him? So he got his smile up again and said, "I'm bringing you these here cupcakes! And—" He reached back to unhook his backpack from one arm and a thought occurred to him: he'd left out part of it the first time, so that was probably why Eric didn't understand. Switching the cupcakes to his other hand, Butters freed the backpack entirely, letting it thud gently on the stoop. "A whole thermos full of coffee too." He pointed down at it, tucked inside the backpack, then grinned some more at Eric.

Eric's breath puffed out his chest, then blew out loudly through his mouth a moment later before he sucked in more air. "Butters, I am trying to be ma _ture_ about this, now that I am no longer a child—"

"Oh, me too!" Butters exclaimed. "That's why I brought coffee and cake—so we could have a coffee party instead of a tea party."

Eric did his mature breathing for another few seconds. "Would you care to tell me what the hell you're talking about, before I murder you?"

"Oh, um." Butters looked down, watching his bear paw scuff over the cement of Eric's front stoop. "I was just thinking, since you can't have tea parties with Cly—" He broke off, not sure if it was okay to talk about this so openly.

"Clyde Frog and the others," Eric said flatly, nodding, almost like he was bored, but Butters had known Eric long enough to know that when the vein on the side of his forehead throbbed like that, Eric was anything but bored. "Go on."

"Uh-um." Usually that throbbing meant something was coming; something that, if Butters wasn't the target of it and even if it sounded like a fine idea, would end up getting him in trouble. But he came here for Eric, so he pushed the words out: "I was thinking we could have coffee and cake in your backyard, like, um—grownups?" He raised his eyebrows to match the hopeful curve of his smile.

Eric snorted out another breath, this time through his nose. His eyes narrowed but not at Butters. This was Eric's thinking face. Butters started to feel a little better, even though Eric's thinking face nearly always meant Butters was going to wind up in a whole heap of trouble. But Butters hadn't seen Eric's thinking face in a while and, truthfully, he kind of missed it. So he smiled a little more, inside, because sometimes when he smiled too much on the outside, Eric would get distracted and wouldn't be able to think and Butters would have to turn around, and he didn't feel like turning around this time.

"Grownups don't have coffee and cake in the backyard, asshole," Eric finally said. "Come on, we'll go into the parlor."

"Great!" Butters bent to pick up the coffee-carrier backpack with his free hand, then straightened up and followed Eric inside. "Hey, Eric—what's a parlor?"

"That's the grownup word for living room," Eric explained in his patient voice, which was one of Butters' favorites. He liked learning things and Eric knew some good ones.

In the living—in the _parlor_ , Butters unpacked everything he'd brought: the thermos, the mugs, and the little matching plates. They sat quietly on the sofa and sipped coffee—which, it turned out, Butters didn't really like this way; but even he knew it was real adult to drink it black—and ate the cupcakes. When he thought Eric wasn't looking, Butters scooped a fingerful of icing off his cupcake and dropped it in his coffee; when Eric didn't know Butters was still looking, Butters saw him do the same.


End file.
